Some patients, or their parents or guardians, must administer pharmaceuticals on a regular basis. For example, children being administered a human growth hormone must generally receive the medication daily. Medications such as human growth hormone are very expensive and are also very critical as to dose. Therefore, it is important that the amount of the medication aspirated into the syringe for each dose be precise. Since the person administering the pharmaceutical may not be medically trained, obtaining accurate, consistent injections is often difficult.
One problem associated with administering human growth hormone using conventional devices and procedures is the complexity involved. For example, one conventional technique requires 15 steps to reconstitute the growth hormone, 16 steps to fill a specially designed glass cartridge, 13 steps to insert the glass cartridge into a specially designed syringe, and 17 steps to inject the dose.
Another problem arises when administering a pharmaceutical to a child on a regular basis. Children do not want to feel that they are different; they do not want others to think they are different. The conventional devices used to prepare some pharmaceuticals, such as human growth hormone, tend to create a stigma of abnormality in the child who undergoes such medical treatment.